This Privacy Policy applies to our interactions with you and others who may visit our retail stores or any of our websites or with whom we may communicate by phone, email or on social media sites, such as Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram, and Google+.

The following websites: “petvalu.com”; “paulmacs.com”; “bosleys.com”; “tisol.ca”; “totalpet.ca”; “performatrin.com”; “headtotaildaily.com”; “franchise.petvalu.com” (collectively referred to below as the “Sites”) are operated by Pet Valu Canada on behalf of itself and its affiliate, Pet Valu, Inc.

As independent businesses, Pet Valu Canada’s franchisees are responsible under applicable laws for adopting their own privacy policies to protect your personal information in a manner consistent with this Privacy Policy.

Why do we collect personal information from you?

process and track returns and exchanges of merchandise and to detect and protect against error or fraud as part of our loss prevention program;

administer our loyalty program;

respond to your questions and provide you with information about our products, services, and promotional activities;

track and analyze customer purchases, other transactions, shopping patterns and website browsing patterns on our Sites and across third party sites, for market analysis purposes or in order to make promotional offers to our customers;

conduct surveys and analysis for research, statistical and product development purposes (information will be anonymized to the extent possible);

provide prospective franchisees with information about our franchise system and franchise opportunities and to qualify prospective franchisees or employees; and

comply with legal and regulatory requirements

We may also collect personal information for purposes not listed above with your consent or where permitted or required by law.

What personal information do we collect and what do we use it for?

We collect personal information from you in a number of ways when you visit our retail stores or outlets, browse our Sites, or otherwise contact us. Such information may be collected directly or indirectly as described below:

Information that is collected directly:

we may collect personal information such as your name, contact information, payment card information and purchase history when you purchase products or services at our retail stores or other retail outlets;

from time to time, we may request and obtain your consent to collect and use your contact information, which could include your name, address, and/or e-mail address, in order to provide you with periodic newsletters or updates, announcements and special promotions regarding our products and services;

when you contact us with a complaint or an inquiry, you may volunteer or we may ask you for information that identifies you (for instance, your name, address or phone number) and any other information we may need in order for us to respond promptly to your complaint or inquiry;

telephone calls to and from our customer service help-desk may be recorded for training and support purposes and, when they are, you will be notified at the outset. Any personal information collected through such records will be used for us to respond to your inquiry or complaint as well as for training purposes with a view to improving our customer service;

when you complete the “Contact Us” box on our Sites, you may provide information that identifies you (for instance, your name, email address or phone number) and any other information you consider we may need in order for us to respond promptly to your complaint or inquiry;

when you complete the “Email Sign Up” box on our Sites, you may provide information that identifies you (for instance, your name and email address) in order for us to send you news, updates and promotions by email;

when you apply to join our loyalty program, you may be asked to provide certain information (for instance, your name, address, phone number, email address, as well as details regarding your pet(s)) as may be required in order for us to administer the program and to provide you with the benefits of such program;

when you voluntarily participate in our customer surveys or contests you may be asked to provide certain personal information (for instance, your name, province, city of residence, email address or phone number, and such other information related to the survey or contest) required for the purposes and administration of the survey or contest and any such information provided for a contest might be published or otherwise used as disclosed in the contest rules; and

when you apply to us for a franchise or for employment, you may be required to provide certain personal information so that we may assess your qualifications.

Information that is collected indirectly:

for security purposes (such as loss prevention), some of our retail stores, warehouse or offices may be monitored by video surveillance cameras. Any personal information collected through such surveillance, including recordings, will only be used for such security purposes and may be disclosed to third parties such as law enforcement personnel in the event of a threat, or “in the event of an actual or perceived threat” (actual or perceived), to the security of our premises, employees or customers, or should there be an anticipated or existing violation of any law;

in order to provide you with a better browsing experience, we might make use of “cookies” which would make it easier for you to access the Sites during future visits. A “cookie” is a small text file that a site stores on your web browser and can later retrieve. Such cookies would enable us to distinguish you from other visitors to our Sites. You can choose to browse our Sites without accepting cookies, by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser to block or reject cookies. But, as cookies allow us to recognize you from page to page within our Sites, and they support your transactions with us, if cookies are disabled or not permitted, while you still would be able to browse our Sites, you might not be able to use the full functionality of our Sites;

third party cookies may be set on your web browser by other websites whose services are used on the Sites. Cookies of this type include the sharing buttons across the Sites which would allow you to share content from our Sites onto social networks. Cookies are currently set on our Sites by Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+. In order to implement these buttons, and connect them to the relevant social networks and external sites, there are scripts from domains outside of our Sites. You should be aware that these other websites may be collecting information about your activity on the internet, including our Sites. For more information, view the privacy policies and terms of these other websites;

our Sites use Google Analytics, a web analytics service provided by Google, Inc. (“Google”), to collect information about the use of our Sites. Google Analytics collects information such as how often users visit our Sites, what pages they visit when they do, and what other sites they visit prior to visiting to our Sites. We use the information we obtain from Google Analytics to improve our Sites, products and services. Google Analytics collects the IP address assigned to you on the date you visit our Sites, but not your name or other identifying information. Google Analytics plants a permanent cookie on your web browser to identify you as a unique user the next time you visit our Sites. According to Google, the cookie cannot be used by anyone but Google. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the Sites (including your IP address) may go outside of Canada to Google servers and may be processed in other countries where Google has servers and so the data collected may be subject to that other country’s governing laws. Google’s ability to use and share information collected by Google Analytics about your visits to our Sites is governed by the Google Analytics Terms of Use and the Google Privacy Policy. You may refuse or otherwise disable the use of cookies, including those used by Google, by selecting the appropriate settings on your browser but, if you do so, you may not be able to access certain features of our Sites. For more information on Google Analytics, please visit Google Analytics at http://www.google.com/analytics/. See also Google’s Privacy Policy at http://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy/ ;

we have also chosen to enable Google’s advertising features, which allow us to collect and access certain demographic and internet data about your visits to our Sites and third party websites, which is collected through Google’s first-party and other third-party cookies. We may use this information to better understand your needs and preferences, and to provide you with advertising that is customized to your inferred interests and preferences. We may also use Google’s advertising feature to show you with Pet Valu ads when you visit third party sites. For example, a cookie may be placed on your computer when you visit one of our Sites, which is recognized and used to show you a Pet Valu advertisement when you visit a third party website. As described above, you may be able to set your browser to refuse cookies. If you refuse cookies you may still receive online advertising; however, it may be less personalized. You may opt-out of these Google advertising features by using Google’s ad settings (https://www.google.com/settings/ads) or by installing the Google opt-out browser add-on;

our Sites may contain links to other websites. We are not responsible for the privacy policies and/or practices on other websites and, when linking to another website, you should read the privacy policy of such website. Our links to such other websites are not intended to be an endorsement of or referral to the other websites. We do not have any control over such other websites and, therefore, have no responsibility or liability for the manner in which the entities that operate such other websites may collect, use or disclose, secure and otherwise treat your personal information

Personal Information of Minors

Our Sites have not been created with a view to targeting or otherwise marketing to children under the age of 13. The Sites are not intended for nor directed at users under the age of 13. We do not collect the ages of those who visit our Sites and we do not knowingly collect personal information from users under the age of 13. If personal information is inadvertently collected from someone under the age of 13, upon being made aware of same, we will use best efforts to delete such data from our records as quickly as possible.

Consent

We collect, use and/or disclose your personal information with your consent, except where authorized or required by law. Consent for the collection, use and/or disclosure of personal information may be obtained orally or in writing and may be expressly given or implied. In determining how we obtain your consent, we take into account the sensitivity of the personal information we are collecting, using and/or disclosing. Subject to certain legal or contractual restrictions and upon reasonable notice, you have the right to withdraw your consent and you can do this by contacting us by email at privacy@petvalu.com or by writing to us at the Contact Us address noted below. If you refuse or withdraw your consent to certain collections, uses or disclosures of personal information we may no longer be able to provide certain products or services to you. For instance, your refusal or withdrawal of consent to collect, use and/or disclose your personal information for the purposes of your participation in our loyalty program could limit our ability to provide you with some of the privileges and opportunities offered to loyalty members. When you provide personal information to us, you are consenting to the manner in which we will collect, use, disclose or otherwise manage your personal information as set out in this Privacy Policy.

Disclosure

We may transfer or disclose personal information as follows:

we may share your personal information with our U.S. affiliates, third-party service providers or agents (collectively, “service providers”) who provide the support services required in order for us to properly serve you, such as customer service, web-site hosting, data management, market analyses, administering our loyalty program, email marketing, advertising, and contest administration, or your personal information may be collected by such service providers on our behalf. We and our service providers may use servers for such purposes which could be located in the United States or other foreign country and, therefore your personal information could be processed and stored in the United States or such other foreign country. We require our service providers to protect the personal information in a manner that is consistent with this Privacy Policy.

we may share your personal information with certain of our suppliers of products for the purposes of administering the loyalty program or to inform them of any questions, concerns or complaints you may raise with us;

we may share your personal information with our U.S. affiliates or any third party business partner in the event we run a joint promotion, as will be specified when your personal information is requested and collected;

we and/or our service providers, suppliers or agents, may provide your personal information in response to a Canadian or foreign search warrant or other legally valid inquiry or order, or to an investigative body in the case of a breach of an agreement or contravention of Canadian or foreign law, or as otherwise required by law. We may also disclose your personal information where necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims; and

if we are acquired by a third party, your personal information could be one of the assets being transferred and by providing your personal information you are consenting to our disclosing your information to any potential purchaser or its advisors on a confidential basis for the purposes of the acquisition transaction and to ensure continuity in the services provided to you

Updating your information

Since we use your personal information to provide services to you, it is important that the information be accurate and up-to-date. If, during the course of our relationship with you, any of your information changes, please contact us, at the Contact Us address noted below, to inform us of that change so that we can continue to provide you with our services.

Your marketing preferences

We will provide you with newsletters, special offers, new product announcements and other information about our stores, products and services by electronic communications (such as, email, text, social media) if we have received your consent to do so.

You can provide us with your marketing preferences, or change your marketing preferences, by contacting us at the Contact Us address noted below

If you decide you do not want to receive the information by email, you have the right to withdraw your consent by clicking on the unsubscribe link in our email to you. You may also withdraw your consent by contacting us at our Contact Us address noted below.

Is your personal information secure?

The security of your personal information is important to us. We take reasonable precautions to ensure that your personal information is protected from loss, unauthorized access, modification or disclosure. We will protect your personal information using security measures that are appropriate to the sensitivity of the information. Access to personal information is limited to those employees and service providers requiring access in the performance of their duties. However, no method of transmission over the internet, method of electronic or physical storage, or other safeguard is 100% secure, therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

We require our service providers to maintain the confidentiality and security of the personal information which has been disclosed to them and not to use or disclose your personal information for any unauthorized purpose. When we are required by law to provide information, we take reasonable steps to verify the lawful authority and we disclose only the information that is legally required.

Access to your personal information

You may ask for access to any personal information we hold about you in order to review, edit, or delete any of it. Summary information is available upon request. More detailed requests that require archival or other retrieval costs may be subject to a minimal fee to recoup the costs involved. Should you wish to request access to your personal information, please contact us at the Contact Us address noted below. We will do our best to accommodate any request, but we cannot guarantee complete compliance as such requests are subject to certain restrictions (see “Can you be denied access to your personal information?” below).

Correcting errors

If you establish that the personal information we have about you is not accurate, complete and up-to-date, we will take reasonable steps to correct such personal information as appropriate.

Can you be denied access to your personal information?

Your rights to access your personal information are not absolute.

We may deny access when:

denial of access is required or authorized by law;

granting you access would have an unreasonable impact on other people’s privacy;

denial of access is reasonable to protect our business’ property rights; or

the request is clearly unreasonable given the circumstances and applicable laws

If we deny your request for access to, or refuse a request to correct information, we will provide you with an explanation why your request was denied.

How long do we keep your personal information?

We keep your personal information for as long as is reasonably necessary for us to fulfill the purposes for which it was collected, or as may be required by law or our record retention requirements, whichever is longer, and your consent to such purposes(s) remains valid after termination of our relationship with you.

Changes to this Privacy Policy / Contact Us

Since we regularly review all of our policies and procedures, we may change our Privacy Policy from time to time without prior notice and such changes take immediate effect. Please direct your privacy questions, comments or requests to: